Sonam Wangchuk News Highlights: ‘Govt aware of his concerns,’ says BJP's Brij Bhushan Singh

People's Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti on Friday criticised the Centre for not engaging with the young protesters at Delhi's Jantar Mantar, saying the government's approach reflected a “colonial mindset”.

"The distressing scenes unfolding at Jantar Mantar, where Sonam Wangchuk is risking his life to safeguard the future of our Gen Z, evoke memories of the sacrifices made by our freedom fighters to liberate India from colonial rule. The British may have left, but the colonial mindset seems to endure," Mehbooba wrote in a post on X.

"How else can one explain the indifference of a democratically elected government that remains so callous that it refuses to engage with the youth at Jantar Mantar, the very generation that will shape India's future?" Mufti asked.

Senior Congress leader Sachin Pilot on Friday called for the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, alleging that the Centre had failed to curb repeated examination paper leaks and remained indifferent to the concerns of students nationwide.

Addressing reporters in Rajasthan's Tonk, Pilot also urged the Union government to open a dialogue with activist Sonam Wangchuk, who has been observing an indefinite hunger strike over the issue of examination paper leaks.

"Wangchuk has been on a hunger strike for nearly 19 days. The government should engage in dialogue and find a solution. The education minister should resign to restore the confidence of students," the Tonk MLA and former deputy chief minister mentioned, as per PTI.

Decades after Indira Gandhi, as prime minister, visited Leh to meet Ladakhi leader Sonam Wangyal during his hunger strike seeking greater rights for the region’s people, the Congress has brought up the historic episode while backing Wangyal’s son Sonam Wangchuk in his current campaign that seeks resignation of Education Minister Dharmedra Pradhan over alleged irregularities in competitive exams.

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The condition of three All India Students' Association (AISA) activists observing an indefinite hunger strike at Delhi's Jantar Mantar over alleged irregularities in competitive examinations worsened on Friday, with doctors recommending immediate hospitalisation for one of the protesters after she developed severe hypoglycaemia, as per PTI.

According to AISA, the three activists — Neha, Aameen and Manish, completed 20 days of their hunger strike, while alleging that the Centre has yet to respond to their demands.

In a statement, the student organisation said Neha's blood sugar level had dropped to a critically low level, prompting doctors to advise her to end the fast and seek immediate hospital treatment before her condition deteriorates further.

The Delhi High Court on Friday agreed to hear a public interest litigation (PIL) on July 20 that alleges continuous and intrusive surveillance of protesters at Delhi's Jantar Mantar, where students are demonstrating over alleged irregularities in the NEET-UG examination, as per PTI.

The petition, filed by former Jawaharlal Nehru University Students' Union (JNUSU) president Aishe Ghosh, was mentioned for an urgent hearing before a bench comprising Chief Justice D K Upadhyaya and Justice Tejas Karia.

Appearing for the petitioner, senior counsel argued that police personnel were moving around the protest site with mobile phones and cameras, claiming that the surveillance was intimidating students and affecting their morale.

The petition further contended that the alleged actions of the police amounted to a violation of the protesters' fundamental right to privacy.

After hearing the request for an urgent listing, Chief Justice Upadhyaya fixed the matter for hearing on Monday.

"We are preponing it (from Wednesday when PILs are heard). Come on Monday," Chief Justice Upadhyaya stated.

Over 160 prominent citizens from various walks of life in Assam, including litterateurs, academics, poets, journalists and retired government officials, on Friday appealed to activist Sonam Wangchuk to end his indefinite fast, saying that "compassion or civility" cannot be expected from a "wooden-hearted and power-driven" dispensation.

They claimed that Wangchuk has exposed the "heartlessness and insensitivity" of those in power by not responding to his protest.

– PTI

Mahatma Gandhi's great-grandson Tushar Gandhi extended support to activist.

As educationist and climate activist Sonam Wangchuk's indefinite hunger strike at Delhi's Jantar Mantar entered its 20th day on Friday, support for his campaign continued to grow. In Himachal Pradesh's Solan, hundreds of young people, women, retired government employees and members of civil society observed a one-day symbolic fast in solidarity with the activist, as per PTI.

Sonam Wangchuk's wife Geetanjali reached Jantar Mantar to meet the activist.

Wangchuk is globally renowned as a passionate advocate for the environment and his home region and has also been involved in public demonstrations for greater constitutional safeguards for Ladakh.

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Climate activist Sonam Wangchuk's indefinite hunger strike has entered its 20th day on Friday, with doctors stating that his fast has reached a crucial stage, suggesting that organ involvement is possible.

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Mahatma Gandhi, Bhagat Singh, Potti Sreeramulu, Irom Sharmila, Anna Hazare… And Sonam Wangchuk today. The list is long, the causes different, the means the same - fasting to register protest and make yourself heard.

From a few days to 16 years. The many hunger strikes of varying scale buried under the sands of time have tugged at the heartstrings of a nation that takes pride in its legacy of fasting against injustice as a protest tool.

As Wangchuk's strike, in solidarity with the Cockroach Janta Party over irregularities in the exam system, entered day 20 on Friday, attention swivelled to Delhi's Jantar Mantar where hundreds have been gathering to express their support to him and other students fasting with him.

Wangchuk's fast unto death lies on the bedrock of hunger strikes through contemporary Indian history, starting with Gandhi and including Irom Sharmila who went off food for 16 years against the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) and holds the record for the longest hunger strike anywhere in the world.

"...a fast which a votary of non-violence sometimes feels impelled to undertake by way of protest against some wrong done by society, and this he does when he as a votary of Ahimsa has no other remedy left. Such an occasion has come my way."

Gandhi, one of the strongest proponents of fasting as a way of protest, wrote this ahead of the last of his 18 fasts on January 13, 1948 from Birla House for restoration of communal peace across the nation. Two weeks later, he was assassinated in the same place.

"I never like to feel resourceless, a Satyagrahi never should. Fasting is his last resort in the place of the sword - his or other's," he wrote in Harijan.

The father of the nation undertook 18 fasts for various reasons, starting from a seven-day fast in Phoenix, South Africa, as penance for the inmates, followed by another daylong fast at the ashram for similar reasons.

The longest of his fasts lasted 21 days, including those for Hindu-Muslim unity, against untouchability, and detention by the British without charges.

Gandhi's idea of hunger strike found resonance in his followers, most prominently with freedom fighter Potti Sreeramulu.

The staunch Gandhian played a pivotal role in the creation of Andhra State. He started fasting in October 1952, demanding a separate state for Telugu speakers, something that prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru had resisted.

On the 58th day, he died.

The region burst into the flames of violent protests, forcing the government to chalk out the land that later came to be known as Andhra Pradesh.

In death, Sreeramulu managed to change the country's map through the sheer resolution of a hunger strike.

According to Ajay Gudavarthy, associate professor of political science at JNU, Gandhi's understanding of fasting went beyond just seeing it as a means for putting pressure on the government.

"...he also saw it as a sense of self purification to make one's own intentions clear. And he thought that arguments don't make intentions clear. The preparedness for suffering does. Fasting was that kind of a self purificatory act to express one's purity of one's own intent," Gudavarthy told PTI.

In pre-Independence India, the names of Bhagat Singh, Batukeshwar Dutt, and Jatindra Nath Das are remembered for leading a hunger strike in 1929 to improve prison conditions where they were held for the killing of John Saunders.

They demanded to be treated as political prisoners and equality in food standards, clothing, toiletries, and access to books and newspapers. The protest received support from Nehru and Mohammed Ali Jinnah.

After 63 days and many attempts by the British government to break their resolve, Das succumbed to starvation.

Singh broke his fast after 116 days but not without securing significant prison reforms for other Indian prisoners.

"It's very well recorded Bhagat Singh's hunger strike led to prison reforms. He was able to change a lot of things in the prison where he was kept," said Ajay Mehra, former principal, Shaheed Bhagat Singh Evening College.

In more recent times, Manipuri activist Irom Sharmila began her hunger strike on November 5, 2000. She was repeatedly arrested in different Indian states before ending her fast on August 9, 2016.

Beyond raising political awareness about the issues surrounding AFSPA, Sharmila's protest achieved little in terms of her original demands. The following year, she entered electoral politics by contesting the state elections but suffered a crushing defeat, securing fewer than 100 votes.

While Sharmila was braving starvation in Manipur, social activist Anna Hazare sat on a hunger strike in Delhi in August 2011 to demand enactment of an anti-corruption law.

Even though the fast lasted 11 days, it caught the public sentiment in a way that was unprecedented in recent years.

Centred around the protest at Delhi's Ramlila Maidan, where thousands of supporters gathered, many similar protests broke out across the nation, demanding a strong anti-corruption law.

The Lokpal Bill was passed by the Lok Sabha in December 2011, by the Rajya Sabha in December 2013 and came into effect on January 16, 2014 after then President Pranab Mukherjee's assent.

In 2013, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal went on a 15-day hunger strike to protest against allegedly inflated electricity and water bills in Delhi.

There have been others.

Activist Medha Patkar went on a 20-day hunger strike in 2006 to protest the raising of the Sardar Sarovar Dam height and demanded rehabilitation of tens of thousands of displaced families.

The same year, TMC leader Mamata Banerjee went on a 26-day hunger strike to protest against the Left Front government's acquisition of fertile farmland in Singur for a Tata Motors factory.

One of the most notable hunger strikes in recent times was undertaken by environmentalist G D Agrawal in June 2018.

An IITian, Agrawal sat on several hunger strikes with demands to stop environmentally damaging projects and ensure the uninterrupted flow of the Ganga. After 111 days on fast, Agrawal died of starvation at the age of 86.

– PTI

Lawyers in Mumbai extended support to Sonam Wangchuk today, as per Bar and Bench.

Leaders from the Congress, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Friday criticised actor Aamir Khan over his statement that his character in the film 3 Idiots was not inspired by education reformer Sonam Wangchuk. They alleged that the actor was reluctant to take a stand due to fear of the ruling dispensation.

RJD Rajya Sabha MP Manoj Jha questioned the timing of Khan's clarification, while AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh also took aim at the actor over his remarks, as per PTI. Congress leader Husain Dalwai said Khan should "learn from actor Naseeruddin Shah on how to speak fearlessly" and, at the very least, express sympathy for Wangchuk.

Former Union Law Minister Ashwani Kumar on Friday met Sonam Wangchuk and urged him to preserve his health and life by ending his fast.

"In any responsive and dignitarian democracy, the lives of conscientious dissenters should be prized and not compromised for any reason.

"This has been our tradition and there have been several occasions when political leadership has risen to the occasion to ensure that precious Indian lives are not lost," the former minister for Law and Justice said in a statement.

"Parliament runs on taxpayer money. Should listen to us. March on July 20 shouldn't be stopped," Abhijeet Dipke told Double Check.

NCP (SP) MP Supriya Sule arrived at Jantar Mantar to meet Sonam Wangchuk.

Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) leader and former Deputy CM of Haryana Dushyant Chautala arrived at Jantar Mantar to meet Sonam Wangchuk.

BJP leader Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh on Thursday urged activist Sonam Wangchuk to end his protest, saying his concerns had already reached the government and the entire country, as per IANS.

Speaking to reporters, Singh said Wangchuk's message had been conveyed nationwide and that the government was aware of his concerns. He urged Wangchuk to call off his protest and exercise patience, adding that everyone had to wait for the due process and that Wangchuk should do the same.

“His message has now reached the entire country, and the government is aware of his concerns. He should now end his protest and wait. Everyone has to wait for the process, and he should do the same. His message has already reached the entire nation,” Singh said.